Je T'Aime
by Nightmare Prince
Summary: She's never been able to say a single word. It doesn't matter though, because she's never needed a voice to say that she loves him. [Won Second Place for the Competition That Must Not Be Named at HPFC]


**Je T'aime**

_She has never said a word_

_._

-(IX)-

The waves whisper across the shore, softly churning spray falling across her face, moonlight glowing across her pale blonde hair as she stands alone.

He comes to find her, in the dark of the night, and slips his hands around her waist, letting her lean into him, their bodies moulding together like two pieces of a puzzle.

The years have passed them by, and she's remained as silent as the gods in the heavens, unable to utter a single sound. She envies her siblings their beautiful voices, her brother's melodies and her sister's lilts.

He holds her close, pressing his lips to her shoulder and letting the gossamer silk slip down to her elbow, his turquoise hair tickling her cheek as she smiles. His mind presses against hers and she allows her shields to fall away, letting him see her thoughts and she feels his lips curve into a grin against her skin.

Her thoughts are enough, pictures and disjointed words that no man can see but him. Her memories are all the words she needs.

-(I)-

She's only one when she hears the screams of her parents and the cackles of strangers, the twisted shrieking of spells tearing the air. Shivering beneath her soft, pink blankets, she cuddles into the pale blue teddy-bear at her side. He's a gift, from her best friend, and she loves her bear as her closest friend.

There's a yell and then it's all silent, making her wonder if it's all a terrible nightmare that she needs to wake up from. Then the yelling begins again and she can see flashes of light beneath her bedroom door, green and red and gold.

Her mother's scream echoes up the stairs and she leaps from her bed, rushing to the ground-floor in her fluffy, yellow footie pyjamas,

She's halfway down the stairs when she sees the burly men, masked in silver and robed in black, hurling jets of crackling light from their wands. Her parents are standing back to back, her mother jinxing in fluent French, her father's scarred face twisted into a feral snarl as a shield erupts across the room, deflecting a stream of sickly orange light up the stairs.

Her mother screams again as she catches sight of her stumble, the curse catching her in the throat and sending her tumbling down the stairs.

-(V)-

She grins as her potion takes on the consistency of mud, bubbling sluggishly in her pewter cauldron as she sits back and takes it off the heat. For nearly a month she's been slaving over this brew, eager to earn an _Outstanding_ in her potion's term assignment – though she could have chosen an easier potion to brew.

It's interesting to challenge herself though, and potions has always been her forte. She hopes to one day be a healer at St. Mungo's – to help people the same way they helped her. Even though they were not able to restore her voice, they did keep her alive . . . and that's something she cherishes.

The polyjuice potion takes on a grey hue, signifying that it's ready and she grins and beckons for the walrus-like potions professor. Unfortunately, the class is rowdy today and her fluttering hand is lost in a sea of chaotic explosions and pungent smoke. Still, she doesn't give up, standing on her tiptoes and craning her fingers to the ceiling in an attempt to catch his attention.

When finally he sees her and strides towards her desk, she's tired and her arm aches, but his face breaks into a broad grin as he congratulates her on her attempt.

Perhaps she's presumptuous to need praise so often . . . but she's already so incapable of so much that her confidence needs boosts along the way. Most of the school knows and they don't hold it against her.

As she leaves with her prize, a new shield cloak – for creating the best potion that day – she feels something tickle her cheek and turns her head, nearly knocking the tiny Pygmy Puff to the ground. The little ball of fluff nuzzles against her as she strokes it with her fingers, eyes widening as it's colour changes to blue and a scrap of parchment appears beside it.

She unfolds it; eyes glisten wetly as she reads the words

_Thinking of you_

_-T_

_-(III)-_

She opens her mouth but no sound escapes save for a twisted keening, the melody of fingernails upon a blackboard. Her mother flinches beside her and her father's face trembles, and so she stops trying to speak to them.

It's easier to keep the garbled vestiges of her speech to herself than to see it break their hearts.

That night, when she's finally home, she can hear her father bellowing at her uncle – the famous one who killed the Dark Lord – demanding that the Death Eaters who did this to her be found and given the kiss. She doesn't understand most of what is being said, but she does comprehend that her daddy is really angry because of what's happened to her.

She snuggles beneath her blankets and fights the urge to scratch at the itchy bandages on her throat, choosing instead to hug her turquoise teddy-bear as tightly as she can and drift to sleep.

_-(VII)-_

She's red in the face and shaking her fist in the air, all the while wishing she had thought to knock before entering this room.

Her youngest female cousin, the one named after a flower, is naked on the bed, cheeks tinged pink whilst holding the sheets to her to hide her modesty. The son of her honorary aunt, the eccentric one who writes for the quibbler, is on the bed as well, covering his arousal with a pillow. She knows the boy's twin very well, he's a healer at St. Mungo's just like her and one of her closest friends.

This isn't something she'd expect from his family at all.

This isn't something she would have ever thought to walk in on whilst celebrating Christmas at the Burrow. This isn't something she would have thought to walk in on period, especially not with this cousin, who's spent so long fighting for her relationship with the former Death Eater's son.

Her cousin tries to explain and fails, and more than ever she wishes she could speak, just so she could yell at her cousin and explain why what's she doing is so very wrong. She's not being judgemental, it's just that she's in a relationship and she knows more than anything that being faithful is one of the most important things to love.

'When it's real, you cannot walk away,' she thinks as she slams the door in disgust, letting her expression say what her words could not.

_-(II)-_

She wakes; her throat on fire. Pain clouding her young mind, she opens her mouth to scream but no sounds comes forth save for a strangled screech and she clasps her hands to her lips in horror.

She's in St. Mungo's, she realises, and her mother's sitting at her bedside with tears in her eyes and a hollow look upon her beautiful face. Her father is pacing, hands folded across his chest, his own cheeks stained with grief and she wonders what's wrong.

The question is just about to leave her mouth when the door opens and an elderly woman is tugged in by her best friend. His eyes are wide as he scrambles up onto the bed beside her and she tries to speak but can't and his face falls in confusion.

Whilst the children stare at each other, both not understanding what's wrong, his grandmother is exchanging low words with her father and she strains to hear what they're saying. Vaguely she makes out that her vocal cords are torn and cannot be repaired . . . she doesn't understand what that means but maybe it's the reason she can't speak.

Then he reaches into his pocket and hands her a small packet, stamped with the Wheezes monogram and she grins at him despite everything. It's Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder – something that they both often use in their pranks, and she knows that she's too young to have it and somehow this small act of rebellion makes her feel better.

He's always been able to make her smile that way.

Always.

_-(IV)-_

She's half asleep in class, her eyelids drooping as the ghost drones on and on about History of Magic, a subject that she thinks would be quite interesting in the hands of a livelier professor. Sadly, the professor they have possesses a strange magic of her own – the power to make people fall asleep without doing much more than open his mouth and speak about the Goblin Wars.

Discretely deciding not to waste the next two hours, she slips her hand into her bag and draws out a tiny pink pill to place onto her tongue, a Patented Daydream Charm. It's barely dissolved when she feels herself drifting, a glazed look appearing over her eyes as she sinks into the world of waking dreams.

She's lying in a meadow, with him at her side, and the grass soft against her back. She turns to lie on her side, her head resting on his arm – just below his shoulder – and smiles at him as he draws little circles down the small of her back.

His hair is turquoise, the tips tinged candyfloss pink as he begins to speak, lulling her with his voice until she responds, her eyes flying open in shock when she hears the sound of her own voice.

The charm is meant to slip into her most beloved dreamland and manifest that which she wishes for the most.

She just isn't sure if she wants her voice . . . or if she wants the boy with turquoise in his hair and the wolf in his eyes.

_-(VIII)-_

A tear trickles down her cheek as she walks away, too worn to avoid his baleful eyes upon her back. She doesn't know why she's telling him that he has to forget her, or why she's said that she wants to forget about him. It's just easier, she reckons, considering that love is already so hard and her lack of a voice just makes theirs all the harder.

She thinks of the time she walked in on her vixen cousin and her beau last Christmas and it resonates within her . . . her cousin was the girl who fought for love the most and was in the bed of another man not two weeks after fighting for their family to accept her love.

It doesn't make sense to her, but if a girl who was so emphatic in her arguments could stray so easily, then there was no point in her fooling herself. She doesn't even have a voice . . . she can't talk – so how can she hold on to him without being able to communicate.

Perhaps she's being silly, but maybe it's easier just to forget.

_-(VI)-_

She coughs, and her dishevel-haired cousin looks at her in concern, rushing forward to quickly pull aside the cauldron before it erupts in a shower of smoking potion. Gasping as her throat clears of the acrid fumes, she lets the boy –fresh out of Hogwarts – lead her to the nearby chair and press a goblet of water to her lips.

Gratefully she sips it and waves him off when he asks her if she wants him to remake the potion from scratch.

Wolfsbane is a dangerous brew to get right and whilst her cousin might be one of the brightest healers-in-training, he doesn't have her experience. Besides . . . she trusts nobody else to make her boyfriend's monthly dosage, one misstep and it would kill him instead of healing him.

Staggering to her feet and tying a scarf around her mouth to keep away the fumes, she rights the cauldron and begins the tedious process from scratch.

She can never tell him that she loves him, so instead she shows him every month, by keeping him safe from the world and letting the world be safe from him. Then, when he's asleep under the effects of the wolfsbane, she'll curl up beside him – regardless to the risk – and fall asleep with her head atop the body of a wolf.

_-(X)-_

She draws her wand and points it to the sand, moving it as if it were a pen and she feels him smile as he reads the words she's written out for him.

_I've tried, but I can't forget you without forgetting myself._

He draws his wand and responds, writing across the sand in the language of her heritage. She reads the words and feels tears spill down her cheeks, and she sinks into him, both falling to the sand as the waves lap over the words and obscure them.

It doesn't matter though, they're imprinted in her mind and she knows that she will never forget.

_Je T'aime, Amoureux._

.

_She's never needed a voice to tell him that she loves him_

* * *

_**A/N: If you enjoyed this story, please do review **_

_**-Written for the Diagon Alley Battle Challenge: Round Five**_

_**Prompts**_

"When it's real, you cannot walk away." "I've tried, but I can't forget you without forgetting myself."

Victoire Weasley; Albus Potter; Lorcan Scamander; Lily Luna Potter

Teddy/Victoire Pairing; Lily/Lysander Pairing

Do not use "?" or Names or Dialogue

Patented Daydream Charm; Pygmy Puff; Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder; Shield Cloak

Wolfsbane; Polyjuice Potion

Human by Christina Perri

_**Also Written for the Competition That Must Not Be Named**_


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